Chapter 916 – Beginning with a Daring Encounter

“Benne had a fling with Kimberly once. She claims the kid is his…”

“Benne told you that?” Sonia cut in.

“Yes, he did. And I chatted with Kimberly myself,” Celsie explained and Sonia sighed as she let her head rest on the headrest of the couch.

“You could have just said so earlier,” Sonia said with a slight frown.

“And miss your theatrics?” Celsie asked with a small smile.

“How is Benne taking it?” Sonia asked, and Celsie shrugged.

“We submitted DNA samples at the lab for paternity test already. We are awaiting the result on Monday. He said a part of him hopes she is his, and the other part of him hope she isn’t,” Celsie explained, and Sonia nodded.

“That makes sense. What about you, then? How do you feel?” Sonia asked, and Celsie took a deep breath.

“That’s what I wanted to talk to you about.”

If there was one thing being with Benne as his partner at the party had shown Celsie the previous night, it was the fact that despite being with Benne all this while and even working closely with him in the office and attending meetings with him, she was still mostly thinking of him as just Benne.

The ordinary guy she had met at the club, and the ordinary guy who had done everything he could to win her heart. The ordinary guy who had left his mansion to live in a little apartment next to hers, and the guy who had left his spacious office to serve as her driver.

Benne was more than that, and seeing him in his element last night in the midst of all those influential people, had told her Benne was a big shot.

A big shot who had become an ordinary guy for her sake just so he could win her heart. A big shot who would have preferred to remain hidden away from the spotlight but had exposed himself for her sake. All because he wanted to protect her.

Now she realized that she too felt possessive towards him, and wanted to protect him from everything that would make him unhappy.

Celsie had thought long and hard about Benne and the situation with Kimberly and Dawn before going to bed last night, and that had been the first thought on her mind when she woke up. What she wanted now was for Sonia to be her sounding board and to let her know if she was going crazy or if she was in her right mind.

“Go on, I’m listening,” Sonia urged Celsie as they turned on the couch to face each other.

“This changes everything, you know? I mean, the possibility of Benne being a father now…”

“Celsie…”

Celsie shook her head when Sonia interrupted, “Hear me out first,” Celsie said, and Sonia sighed and gave her a nod.

“At first when Benne told me about it, all I could think about was how this would affect me and our relationship. I even ran away from him, but then thanks to Harry I had to think about how it would affect Benne too. This will indeed change everything whether or not we want to admit it,” Celsie said, and Sonia nodded without saying a word.

“I love Benne, Sony,” Celsie said and Sonia smiled.

“I know you do.”

“I’ve only come to realize just how much I love him in the last couple of days of his absence. And even now I’m still thinking about how wonderful he is. Benne is a great guy and he deserves all the happiness he can get…”

“Why does that sound like you’re about to say you want to break up and let him go?” Sonia asked with a frown, and Celsie laughed softly.

“I never want to let him go, Sony. I don’t want to lose him. Not for any reason if I can help it. I don’t think Benne is someone I can afford to live without right now,” Celsie assured Sonia, and she relaxed.

“That’s good then. But you still haven’t told me how you feel about this,” Sonia said, and Celsie nodded.

“I know this is going to sound weird, but I actually feel sort of jealous of Kimberly,” Celsie said, and Sonia’a eyes widened in disbelief.

“Jealous? Why? Why would you feel jealous of her? When Benne is yours and not hers,” Sonia said matter of factly.

“She met Benne first. She was with him first. And from all indications she possibly has Benne’s child,” Celsie stated quietly.

“So, what? Men have baby mamas all the time, that doesn’t mean they all marry their baby mamas. Benne is madly in love with you. You should have see how lonely he looked during breakfast. And he said it’s because he misses you. I know Benne isn’t going to want to be with her…”

“That’s not what I’m saying. A part of me just wishes that I was the one who had his child not her or anyone else,” Celsie said without meeting Sonia’s gaze, and Sonia’s jaw dropped in surprise. She hadn’t been expecting that.

“What? But you don’t even want kids,” Sonia reminded her.

“I know. I know it sounds absurd, but that’s just how I feel. I know it’s silly and the deed has probably been done already, but I don’t want anyone else having that sort of connection with Benne. When I first saw the kid’s picture I was drawn to her. You know, it was like some sort of magnetic pull. I thought I was just being curious about her because she sort of reminds me of Benne. But then the more pictures I saw, the more I wanted to see. And then before going to bed last night I was looking at the kid’s pictures and out of no where a thought occurred to me. It was like I was wishing she was mine,” Celsie said, and tears gathered in Sonia’s eyes.

“Oh, Celsie,” Sonia murmured softly, and Celsie shook her head.

“I know. I know I’m being weird. I feel weird too,” Celsie said, and Sonia took her hands.

“I don’t think it’s weird. I think it’s just so beautiful that you love Benne so much that you’ve naturally opened your heart to the kid even if you’re not certain she is his yet,” Sonia said, and Celsie sighed.

“Maybe. But I have a deep feeling that she is his. Kimberly sounds so convincing too. What do you know about her? Do you think she is someone I should worry about?” Celsie asked, and Sonia paused to think about it for a moment.

“Well, you know some times people are different from what they post on social media,” Sonia started and Celsie gave her a nod.

“True. Still, you can tell a bit about them from years of observation if you’ve been an ardent follower as you claim,” Celsie said and Sonia shrugged.

“Well, from the little I know about her from social media, she is cool. Carefree. She is the definition of miss independent and says she raises her daughter to be that way too. She never posts stuff about men. I remember she was going to get married some years ago. I believe I mentioned it to you then. He jilted her on their wedding day and the news was all over the place. It trended for weeks. She deleted everything on her page and took a long time off social media. By the time she came back months later, she had a babybump so everyone naturally assumed the baby belonged to her ex fiancé and no questions were asked. Since then she hasn’t posted anything about having a man. Hold on. I saved a clip from one of her interviews some time ago where she was asked about it,” Sonia said as she rose to pick up her hand bag from where she had been seated before and took her phone from it.

“I saved it because I liked her outfit and wanted to get something similar,” Sonia explained as she scrolled through the videos on her phone.

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